Chapter 1
Rictor’s ears were pounding. He could taste copper, but couldn’t be sure where the blood was coming from, or if it was even his. He tried to open his eyes, but the light felt like an icepick speared straight into his brain. He groaned, trying to take stock of his surroundings, even if he couldn’t see. He was on a cold, hard surface, probably concrete. He could hear indistinct noises somewhere far away. He strained to remember what had happened before he woke up.
He had been with X-Force… They’d been called in to deal with a mutant with… uncontrollable interdimensional abilities. Motherfucker. If he was stuck in an alternate universe, he was going to be so incredibly pissed. As far as he knew, Cable was much more adept at traversing the timestream than universe hopping. So if he really was in an alternate universe, he had no idea how long it’d take for X-Force to find him.
Rictor was planning to just keep laying on the floor until he could actually open his eyes without vomiting, but his plans were interrupted by the sound of shuffling only a few feet away from him. He shot up, ignoring the wave of nausea and dizziness that hit him. He blinked, forcing his eyes to adjust.
Sitting up against the wall opposite him was a man about his age. He was… memorable. He had waist-length curly red hair spilling down his shoulders. His skin was pale, almost unhealthily so. His left eye bore a star-shaped birthmark or more likely tattoo over it. Rictor couldn't help but think how painful that must’ve been. The man was wearing a thick metal collar around his neck and a white uniform with two swords strapped to his back. Well, Rictor assumed his uniform was supposed to be white. It was covered almost completely in blood, with only hints of the original color peeking out. The man was mostly covered in blood, in fact, though it was clear that he had attempted to clean his face. It hadn’t worked, he just had blood smeared all over his face. He was sitting down, but Rictor could tell that he was taller than any human should be. He was fucking scary.
Rictor pressed himself up against the wall closest to him, trying to put as much distance between him and the stranger as possible. Rictor was in no position to fight, didn’t know if his powers worked the same here, or if he was close enough to the earth to be able to use them at all. For all he knew, they could be in a floating jail miles above the ground. He didn’t feel the same intrinsic connection to the earth he always felt, which didn’t bode well. There was no way he could take this guy without powers. Who knew who else he was working with? Rictor did his best to control his breathing.
The man was looking at him with a completely blank expression, body still as a statue. Slowly, he held up his hands, palms facing Rictor. The man stood up, hesitating when Rictor visibly tensed. He removed his swords and lay them on the ground. With slow, easily telegraphed movements, he made his way over to Rictor’s side of the room. Rictor was right about his inhuman height. He had to be at least seven feet tall.
Rictor tried to reach out with his powers, tried to cause a minor earthquake, something to distract the man, but he couldn’t feel anything. He was completely cut off from the earth.
The man sat down beside him, keeping a few feet of distance between them. He looked Rictor up and down.
“Listen… I’m not here to hurt you, please just leave me alone,” Rictor tried, hoping to appeal to the empathy of a man covered in someone else’s blood.
The man tipped his head to the side, one eyebrow raised. They stared at each other for a long moment. Rictor’s heart felt like it was about to combust. He was still desperately trying to control his breathing, to no avail. The man reached a hand out towards Rictor’s chest, but he crawled out of reach, pressing himself into a corner. The man was undeterred, approaching him slowly with his hand still outstretched. Rictor was good at reading body language, Cable made sure of that. He still couldn’t get a read on this guy. He had no idea if he was relaxed, agitated, angry, upset, annoyed. That made him all the more dangerous. An unknown and unpredictable enemy was the most lethal.
Rictor almost jumped out of his skin when the man’s hand came to rest in the center of his chest, right over his sternum. Rictor expected the man to use the opportunity to pin him down, crush his ribs, collapse his lungs, anything. Instead he just kept his hand steady on Rictor’s chest. They stayed like that for a few minutes, Rictor frozen and the man seemingly content to feel the rapid rise and fall of his lungs. When the man feels no change in the erratic breathing, he uses his free hand to take Rictor by the wrist and mirror the gesture on himself. He places Rictor’s hand on the center of his chest and holds it there. The man takes a large, exaggerated breath, pressing Rictor’s hand to him so he can feel the movement. Rictor tentatively tries to match him on the next inhale. The man nods approvingly. At least, Rictor assumes its approval.
They stayed like that for even longer, hands on each other’s chests while Rictor tried to match his breathing. Even more confusing than the situation itself was that it actually succeeded in calming Rictor down. He was still freaking out about being stuck in an alternate dimension with no conceivable way of getting home, but he wasn’t in imminent danger of having a panic attack now. He sighed, dropping his hand. He was about to thank the man when a loud metal clang startled him.
A woman entered the room, dressed in heavy-duty armor that only confirmed Rictor’s suspicions that he was stuck in some sort of prison. It certainly looked like a prison, but he had no idea why he was in there. He wanted to ask the woman, but it was clear she was not the kind of person who entertained any perceived slights from subordinates, and he didn’t want to risk his questioning being perceived as an insult to her authority. Normally he wouldn’t care, but he was in an unknown environment and he needed to play by the rules to the best of his ability. She didn’t spare Rictor a single look, keeping her eyes trained on the red-headed man as if he were a dangerous animal. It made Rictor wonder if he should’ve been treating him the same way. He shook off the idea. The man had just coaxed him out of a panic attack, he deserved better than to be compared to a feral creature.
The man glared at the woman, looking her up and down. Something told him that they had known each other for a while. There was a certain hostility between them that could only be cultivated through months, if not years of resentment. She said something in a language Rictor didn’t understand, and fuck, as if his day couldn’t get any worse, he was stuck in an alternate dimension that spoke a language he didn’t speak. That was swell.
Whatever the woman had said must have made sense to the man, seeing as he stood up and followed the woman out of the room without saying a word. The metal door slammed shut again and Rictor was left alone. He sighed and let his head fall back against the wall behind him. He was unbelievably fucked. He wasn’t an expert on interdimensional travel, but he knew enough to know that it was extremely complicated, and trying to find someone stuck in another dimension if you didn’t know exactly what dimension they were in was like trying to find a specific grain of sand in an infinite desert. He could only hope that the mutant X-Force had been after was cooperative and competent enough to track him down or at least tell the team what dimension he’d been dropped into. But he couldn’t count on that. He couldn’t bet on the team finding him, which meant he had to figure out a way to get back himself. As he let his thoughts wander, he noticed a weight around his neck. He felt it with his hand and reasoned that it was the same metal collar he had seen on the man. Maybe it was how this place kept tabs on their prisoners.
He heard the noises outside the room getting louder. It sounded like cheering. Not like a few people, but a stadium full of people. He heard someone on a speaker say something in the language he didn’t understand and covered his ears. The last thing he needed was for his headache to turn into a migraine. He needed every advantage he could get, and being in relatively good health was an advantage. Albeit a small one if he didn’t have his powers.
Being alone was something else to take advantage of. He was probably being surveilled, but there wasn’t much he could do about that. Now that he was more in control of himself, he did another sweep of his surroundings. The room was small, barely large enough for two people, let alone one of the other man’s size. There were two metal slats at the back of the room, on over the other, which Rictor figured were the world’s saddest bunk beds. There weren’t any pillows or blankets, but that was the least of his concerns. There wasn’t a toilet or shower, so Rictor figured at some point the guard would have to let them out for that. There weren’t any windows except for a small one in the door, but there was a metal covering over it that blocked him from actually being able to see outside the room. It cold but luckily he was still wearing his own clothes. A long-sleeved black shirt, a green vest, and his favorite pair of jeans. It was enough to dull the chill of the room, and he had to count his blessings. He was still wearing his boots, which meant, if he was lucky, that he still had the knife tucked into the sole.
He tried not to be too obvious as he stuck his index and middle finger into his left shoe, feeling around so he could pull up the fabric. Sure enough, he could feel the handle of his knife. He quickly pulled his hand out, elated at his first real victory since he’d gotten stuck here.
It was hard to keep track of time but it wasn’t long before the metal door was opening again with a deafening noise and his roommate was stomping back into the room, covered in what looked like fresh blood over the older dried blood. Rictor had thought maybe the man wouldn’t be coming back. He was starting to wish that had been the case. It was a lot easier to plan a prison break when you weren’t stuck in a tiny room with someone who might hinder your plans.
The man kept his eyes on the floor, not bothering to look at Rictor. Some part of him bristled. Rictor had been so keyed up and worried about danger that he hadn’t dared to take his eyes off the man for a second, but this guy didn’t even bother glancing at him every once in a while to make sure he wasn’t planning to kill him or something. Like there was no possible way Rictor was a threat worth keeping an eye on. He knew he was being unreasonable, but he was having a shitty day so he felt justified in being petty. He took the time to study the man more closely than he had before. He had assumed that all the blood had been someone else’s, but there were deep cuts along his arms, legs, and abdomen. Rictor was willing to bet his back wasn’t much better. The man’s uniform had been ripped to shreds, more closely resembling rags than it did an outfit.
Rictor wondered what the man had done while he was gone. He felt his annoyance melt away at the realization that this man was probably in the exact same position as he was. Stuck in a tiny concrete box, with a complete stranger who may or may not be hostile. He wondered if that was why the man had acted so oddly when Rictor woke up. Was he trying to placate him? Maybe the man had woken up one day in this tiny room and gone through exactly what Rictor had. The confusion, frustration, fear. Maybe he just wanted to help Rictor through that.
He noticed the man had curled in on himself, his head in between his knees, his arms wrapped around his body. He looked miserable and despite his better judgment, Rictor wanted to comfort him. He figured it was the least he could do since the man had done the same for him.
“Hey,” He whispered, not wanting the guard, or anyone else, to overhear. He doubted anyone in the building understood English, but he wasn’t going to risk it.
The man didn’t look up, but he tensed slightly. Rictor pressed on.
“Can you understand me?” The man did look up that time. He did the same curious head tilt at Rictor’s question.
“Can… Can you talk? Are you mute or something?” Rictor asked, realizing that he hadn’t heard the man speak even to the guard. The man furrowed his eyebrows and Rictor groaned, closing his eyes in frustration. He repeated all of the questions in Spanish, just in case, but he didn’t have any more luck.
He was about to give up when he had an idea. He scooted over to the man’s side of the room, keeping a few feet apart. The man looked at him with obvious suspicion and Rictor figured that was fair considering the circumstances. He pointed at his chest, nodding slightly when the man’s eyes tracked the movement. He tapped his chest with his finger a few times to drive the point home.
“Rictor,” He said, continuing to point at his own chest.
He was worried that the gesture wouldn’t translate to whatever this dimension’s cultural equivalent was, but the expression on the man’s face was so obvious, so different from the impassive look before, he could practically see the lightbulb above his head. The man nodded enthusiastically.
“R-Rictor,” He stumbled over the “R” sounds, but he tried a few times and Rictor nodded when he got it right. Rictor wanted to smile but he was worried that would be seen as a sign of aggression.
The man pointed to himself and Rictor nodded encouragingly. He made a sound that was hard for Rictor to understand as a name. Luckily the man repeated it a few times and he finally got it.
“Gaveedra,” The man - Gaveedra said.
Rictor couldn’t help his smile as he said the name, “Gaveedra.”